Interesting response, John. This is a short poem by Longfellow that is obviously about returning to a place from oneís past. It reminds me of (re)visiting places many years down the track that I lived as a child or talking to those who have had this experience. If you havenít been back in years, a common response seems to be the sense of shock at how much smaller everything is in relation to the pictures in your head.

This poem maybe relates more to those who have years spent abroad and lost touch with Ďback homeí, which has become, in some respects, like a foreign country:

Changed

From the outskirts of the town
Where of old the mile-stone stood.
Now a stranger, looking down
I behold the shadowy crown
Of the dark and haunted wood.

Is it changed, or am I changed?
Ah! the oaks are fresh and green,
But the friends with whom I ranged
Through their thickets are estranged
By the years that intervene.

Bright as ever flows the sea,
Bright as ever shines the sun,
But alas! they seem to me
Not the sun that used to be,
Not the tides that used to run.

I use this one to give the students an idea of my life outside the classroom (best used with advanced adults). It always prompts a lively discussion.

One day Shanghai caves in like the nose of a syphilitic
People start falling into the Huangpu river oozing with spit
The karaoke torture chambers live it up,
obscene to anthropomorphised cats
They throw off their undies, one last aeroplane

I come out of the metro at Lujiazui
and put on my head like a wig
the burnt out skyscrapers of lust
People in terror. The unchewed avarice
within my mouth wriggles its legs out

But Iíll not be condemned; Iíll not be that guy
My empty Qingdaos will be
(like the tools of prophets) treasured.
All those with caved in noses know it:
Iím Ė your Johnny

Your last judgement sends me down to Hengshan Lu!
I alone will be carried to burn paper like Tomb Sweeping Fest
by whores, Iím a thing of adoration
they will show as their vindication

And all over Pudong and Puxi
The burnouts and the save-the-worlders
know the clap ravaged phoenix will rise again

There is no frigate like a book, to take us lands away.
Nor any coursers like a page of prancing poetry.
This traverse may the poorest take without oppress of toll.
How frugal is that chariot that bears the human soul.

It was a day like any other,
The same dull sky, the same drab street.
There was the usual angry pother
From the policeman on his beat.
Proud of his fine new miter's luster,
The archpriest strutted down the nave;
And the pub rocked with brawl and bluster,
Where scamps gulped down what fortune gave.
The market women buzzed and bickered
Like flies above the honeypots.
The burghers' wives bustled and dickered,
Eyeing the drapers' latest lots.
An awe-struck peasant stared and stuttered,
Regarding an official door
Where yellow rags of paper fluttered:
A dead ukase of months before.
The fireman ranged his tower, surveying
The roofs, like the chained bears one sees;
And soldiers shouldered arms, obeying
The drill sergeant's obscenities.
Slow carts in caravans went winding
Dockward, where floury stevedores moiled;
And, under convoy, in the blinding
Dust of the road, a student toiled,
And won some pity, thus forlorn,
From the drunk hand who poured his scorn
In curses on some pal and brother. . . .
Russia was aching with the thorn
And bearing her old cross, poor mother.
That day, a day like any other,
And not a soul knew that Lenin was born!

Fly away on wings of wind
To native lands, our native song,
To there, where we sang you freely,
Where we were so carefree with you.
There, under the hot sky,
With bliss the air is full,
There, to the murmur of the sea, mountains doze in the clouds.
There, the sun shines so brightly,
Bathing [our] native mountains in light.
In the meadows, roses bloom luxuriously,
And nightingales sing in the green forests;
And sweet grape grows.
There is more carefree for you, songÖ
And so fly away there!

A.Borodin, V.Stasov

Perhaps not the most poetic writing in the world, but listen to it sung.

Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there; I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,
I am the sun on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morningís hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft star-shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there; I did not die.